Sunday, October 28, 2007

We had a couple of halloween parties on Saturday night and here is a picture of our entourage.

Marc is "The Professor", I'm Ginger, my brother Jeff is the Skipper, my brother Scott is Gilligan, my SIL Courtney is MaryAnne (a knocked-up version) and my SIL Jessica is Mrs. Howell. I think we did a pretty good job of pulling this one off, although this was pretty simple compared to previous years.

A couple of years ago we were all oompa loompas and Scott was Willy Wonka. We made these costumes ourselves, and in case you haven't noticed, we take dressing up for halloween pretty seriously.

As you can see, we had a lot of fun being oompa loompas. But the first group costume we did was the year that we all got into the Harry Potter books. We each chose a character - I was Hermoine and Marc was Harry. And I still can't get over how Jessica actually pulled off being Dobby!

And if you haven't had your fill of halloween pictures yet, don't worry, we still have to see what Marc ends up carving on his pumpkin and I'm sure to get a few cute pics of my nephews on Halloween night.

We had a couple of halloween parties on Saturday night and here is a picture of our entourage.

Marc is "The Professor", I'm Ginger, my brother Jeff is the Skipper, my brother Scott is Gilligan, my SIL Courtney is MaryAnne (a knocked-up version) and my SIL Jessica is Mrs. Howell. I think we did a pretty good job of pulling this one off, although this was pretty simple compared to previous years.

A couple of years ago we were all oompa loompas and Scott was Willy Wonka. We made these costumes ourselves, and in case you haven't noticed, we take dressing up for halloween pretty seriously.

As you can see, we had a lot of fun being oompa loompas. But the first group costume we did was the year that we all got into the Harry Potter books. We each chose a character - I was Hermoine and Marc was Harry. And I still can't get over how Jessica actually pulled off being Dobby!

And if you haven't had your fill of halloween pictures yet, don't worry, we still have to see what Marc ends up carving on his pumpkin and I'm sure to get a few cute pics of my nephews on Halloween night.

Thursday, October 25, 2007

This week I've learned about a change being made to the adoption process that will make our wait-time to travel after referral go from about 1 month, to at least 2 months. Just one more "bump" in the long and bumpy road of international adoption. And not only does the road seem to be getting bumpier, it's getting longer too! Since we have been DTV (on the official waiting list) our agency has not received any referrals. It's been over a month and I definitely expected to have moved up a couple of spots on the list by now. Surprisingly, I'm not getting upset about the lack of good news. Our journey to parenthood has been full of unexpected twists and turns and this is nothing compared to what we've already endured. I'm keeping myself busy with plans for the nursery and the excitement for my shower is overwhelming (thanks to all of the secretive planning my mom and SIL's are doing). And to keep myself even more busy, I've recently started a new Poppy project - be sure to check your mailbox over the next couple of days. (and by mailbox, I mean the one that is outside of your house, not your email inbox)

Oh, and one more bummer I had this week - as I was in the middle of listening to "Eat, Pray, Love", it suddenly went blank! One of the cd's I uploaded it from was damaged!! And now because of the popularity of the book, there is a really long waiting list to get another audio book. Just my luck this week. So while I'm waiting for my referral, and waiting to travel, and waiting for my new audiobook, maybe I'll write my own book called "Eat, Pray, Wait".

This week I've learned about a change being made to the adoption process that will make our wait-time to travel after referral go from about 1 month, to at least 2 months. Just one more "bump" in the long and bumpy road of international adoption. And not only does the road seem to be getting bumpier, it's getting longer too! Since we have been DTV (on the official waiting list) our agency has not received any referrals. It's been over a month and I definitely expected to have moved up a couple of spots on the list by now. Surprisingly, I'm not getting upset about the lack of good news. Our journey to parenthood has been full of unexpected twists and turns and this is nothing compared to what we've already endured. I'm keeping myself busy with plans for the nursery and the excitement for my shower is overwhelming (thanks to all of the secretive planning my mom and SIL's are doing). And to keep myself even more busy, I've recently started a new Poppy project - be sure to check your mailbox over the next couple of days. (and by mailbox, I mean the one that is outside of your house, not your email inbox)

Oh, and one more bummer I had this week - as I was in the middle of listening to "Eat, Pray, Love", it suddenly went blank! One of the cd's I uploaded it from was damaged!! And now because of the popularity of the book, there is a really long waiting list to get another audio book. Just my luck this week. So while I'm waiting for my referral, and waiting to travel, and waiting for my new audiobook, maybe I'll write my own book called "Eat, Pray, Wait".

Monday, October 22, 2007

On Saturday, I went on a day of wine tastings with the girls from school. We rented a limo and headed up to Canada to visit the wineries in and around Jordan Village. I work with an awesome group of girls and we always have fun when doing our "extracurricular" activities.

Here I am trying to get this party started - cracking open a bottle of champagne!

This is the first winery we stopped at (and Carrie almost got us kicked out of this one)

And what started out as crappy weather, turned into an absolutely beautiful day.

This week I'm busy working on our halloween costumes for a party we're going to on Saturday...

On Saturday, I went on a day of wine tastings with the girls from school. We rented a limo and headed up to Canada to visit the wineries in and around Jordan Village. I work with an awesome group of girls and we always have fun when doing our "extracurricular" activities.

Here I am trying to get this party started - cracking open a bottle of champagne!

This is the first winery we stopped at (and Carrie almost got us kicked out of this one)

And what started out as crappy weather, turned into an absolutely beautiful day.

This week I'm busy working on our halloween costumes for a party we're going to on Saturday...

Thursday, October 18, 2007

I know this is not adoption-related at all (you should proably get used to that, I don't anticipate having much to share for a little while), but I have to tell you about "Eat, Pray, Love" by Elizabeth Gilbert. As long as you don't live in a deep, dark cave, I'm sure you've heard about this book by now - it's been on Oprah, NPR, various booklists, etc. And usually I'm not one to jump on the band wagon, but something about this book got me hooked! So I reqested it online through the public library, but I inadvertently requested the audio version. When I went to pick it up, I was expecting the print version, but I still took the audio in the mean-time. I immediately noticed that it was read by the actual author, so I decided to upload it to my ipod and give it a listen.

This audiobook is soooo good that everyday I just can't wait to get in my car so I can listen to more of it! The author's voice is so calming and relaxing and I feel like she's one of my best friends now. The book itself is very interesting, but what I love about it is the way she tells it, her descriptions, her love of writing, journaling - it makes me want to go out and buy hundreds of journals and write down everything. Most of all it has made me grateful that I've stumbled upon the world of blogging and that I'll have an account of my life in the months leading up to Poppy's arrival.

I know this is not adoption-related at all (you should proably get used to that, I don't anticipate having much to share for a little while), but I have to tell you about "Eat, Pray, Love" by Elizabeth Gilbert. As long as you don't live in a deep, dark cave, I'm sure you've heard about this book by now - it's been on Oprah, NPR, various booklists, etc. And usually I'm not one to jump on the band wagon, but something about this book got me hooked! So I reqested it online through the public library, but I inadvertently requested the audio version. When I went to pick it up, I was expecting the print version, but I still took the audio in the mean-time. I immediately noticed that it was read by the actual author, so I decided to upload it to my ipod and give it a listen.

This audiobook is soooo good that everyday I just can't wait to get in my car so I can listen to more of it! The author's voice is so calming and relaxing and I feel like she's one of my best friends now. The book itself is very interesting, but what I love about it is the way she tells it, her descriptions, her love of writing, journaling - it makes me want to go out and buy hundreds of journals and write down everything. Most of all it has made me grateful that I've stumbled upon the world of blogging and that I'll have an account of my life in the months leading up to Poppy's arrival.

I've had all these posts adding up in my head, but not enough time to sit down and type them, so here I go...

This weekend is the 1 year anniversary of the "Surprise October Storm" that we got hit with last year. Just last week we were breaking records of 85 degree weather in October, and here is a picture of us at the same time last year! Crazy, I know.

We lost power for almost a week and all the schools in the area were closed for over a week! A lot of trees were damaged and had to be cut down this year. We got together with our block club this summer and purchased some trees with grant money. Here's a picture of Marc planting one of them.

In other news, I had a book club meeting this week and this past month's book was:

And I have to tell you that this was one of our favorite books we've read so far! For this month, we wanted to read something on the scary side, so we decided on:

Ooooh, a ghost story! I love telling ghost stories to the kids in the library!

Ok, enough about the weather and books - the other night I had a dream about Poppy! The three of us were at the beach, we were the only ones there and the sun was beginning to set. Marc was holding Poppy's hands as she was trying to walk and I could see her tiny footprints in the sand. I was trying to get her to say "Momma" and she was making noises, but they didn't really sound like momma. That was my first vivid dream like that and it was really cool.

I've had all these posts adding up in my head, but not enough time to sit down and type them, so here I go...

This weekend is the 1 year anniversary of the "Surprise October Storm" that we got hit with last year. Just last week we were breaking records of 85 degree weather in October, and here is a picture of us at the same time last year! Crazy, I know.

We lost power for almost a week and all the schools in the area were closed for over a week! A lot of trees were damaged and had to be cut down this year. We got together with our block club this summer and purchased some trees with grant money. Here's a picture of Marc planting one of them.

In other news, I had a book club meeting this week and this past month's book was:

And I have to tell you that this was one of our favorite books we've read so far! For this month, we wanted to read something on the scary side, so we decided on:

Ooooh, a ghost story! I love telling ghost stories to the kids in the library!

Ok, enough about the weather and books - the other night I had a dream about Poppy! The three of us were at the beach, we were the only ones there and the sun was beginning to set. Marc was holding Poppy's hands as she was trying to walk and I could see her tiny footprints in the sand. I was trying to get her to say "Momma" and she was making noises, but they didn't really sound like momma. That was my first vivid dream like that and it was really cool.

Monday, October 8, 2007

We went to a little town called Skaneatles this weekend for a little r & r. We hit up a few wineries along Seneca Lake on our way down and stocked up on wine and champagne. The bed and breakfast we stayed at was amazing - I already can't wait to go back! And then today was "shop 'til you drop" day. There were tons of little boutiques in the village we stayed in and then we even managed to stop at a mall on our way home. Here's a picture from our walk out onto the pier this morning - we couldn't believe the weather!

We went to a little town called Skaneatles this weekend for a little r & r. We hit up a few wineries along Seneca Lake on our way down and stocked up on wine and champagne. The bed and breakfast we stayed at was amazing - I already can't wait to go back! And then today was "shop 'til you drop" day. There were tons of little boutiques in the village we stayed in and then we even managed to stop at a mall on our way home. Here's a picture from our walk out onto the pier this morning - we couldn't believe the weather!

Thursday, October 4, 2007

I've been teaching a "culture" lesson to my 5th graders this week and it's so exciting to be able to teach them about the diversity of our nation, as well as so many other countries around the world (and of course I gave a little plug about Vietnam). Next week I am going to read them "Everybody Bakes Bread" and I am planning on bringing in examples of bread from different cultures. I'm thinking of bringing in french baguette as one of the examples, which would obviously represent France, but it's also an important part of the Vietnamese cuisine due to the fact that they were occupied by France for many years. This is something that I didn't know until recently, but I thought it was pretty interesting.

I'm definitely looking forward to a much-needed long weekend starting tomorrow! I had every intention of making a fabulous Vietnamese dinner of coconut curry chicken tonight, but was too exhausted to even attempt it.

I've been teaching a "culture" lesson to my 5th graders this week and it's so exciting to be able to teach them about the diversity of our nation, as well as so many other countries around the world (and of course I gave a little plug about Vietnam). Next week I am going to read them "Everybody Bakes Bread" and I am planning on bringing in examples of bread from different cultures. I'm thinking of bringing in french baguette as one of the examples, which would obviously represent France, but it's also an important part of the Vietnamese cuisine due to the fact that they were occupied by France for many years. This is something that I didn't know until recently, but I thought it was pretty interesting.

I'm definitely looking forward to a much-needed long weekend starting tomorrow! I had every intention of making a fabulous Vietnamese dinner of coconut curry chicken tonight, but was too exhausted to even attempt it.